The Union home ministry's disaster management experts have warned of a bigger catastrophe, earthquakes with a magnitude of 8.2 or greater on the Richter scale which may hit the already ruptured Himalayan region. They say quakes with higher intensity than the one that struck Manipur on Monday are likely to rock the region in future. The tectonic shift a series of these recent earthquakes have caused in the region -- Manipur 6.7 (Jan 2016), Nepal 7.3 (May 2015) and Sikkim 6.9 (2011) -- have re-ruptured the plates that had already developed cracks during previous temblors. This has led to conditions which might trigger multiple earthquakes which may go up to 8.0 in magnitude.
